Art Trap Productions

It's Series 31 or 1, not 5 says Steven Moffat

In a recent DWIN blog post, it quotes Steven Moffat, new series Executive Producer and Lead Writer for Doctor Who speaking of the upcoming series for the year 2010 (Matt Smith's first series as the 11th Doctor) in the latest issue of Doctor Who Monthly magazine:

"It’s Series Thirty-One of Doctor Who, and it's Series One of Matt Smith's Doctor, Those are both real numbers. I submit that 'Series Five of Doctor Who' means absolutely nothing unless you really believe that Matt Smith is the third Doctor. Everyone knows he's the Eleventh Doctor so that means it’s definitely not 'Series Five'. Whichever number you choose, 'Series Five' is the one that's flawed."

"'Series One' is an exciting sentence. 'Series Thirty-One' is an awe-inspiring sentence. 'Series Five' is a boring sentence - and also a complete lie."

The blog post also reports of unconfirmed talk that the DVD sets and other merchandise will be branded as 'Doctor 11, Series 1.'

So let the debate end, or simply call it whatever you wish, but we now have the thoughts of the executive producer of the series in question on the matter.

Sorry Grand Moff, I can see what you're trying to do, but it's simply too confussing to call the 2010 series, 'series 1' because what do all us new series fans call the 2005 series. 'series 1 but not anymore'

It doesn't make sense to keep calling a show series 1 again when "Doctor Who" has been a long tiime favorite. I would go with series 5 We've had four wonderful years (and a year of specials) and now he wants to go back to 1?! That doesn't really make sense.

It also becomes confusing because you get to the point of "Which series one are you talking about?"

I think people are reading way too much into this. Some people are also ripping Moffat on the GE Facebook post of the above article.

I strongly suspect that this quote is taken somewhat out of context...even the source blog only posted the snippet of the quote. Moff's not trying to forget the RTD years...if he wanted to do that, he wouldn't have said series 31.

He can call it "Series Chicken Noodle Soup", and it's not going to change the fact that he's building on the past 30+ seasons of Who...RTD and all.

I can see why RTD/BBC numbering the first 4 series (seasons for us yanks) of the new DW, starting with series 1, with the thought that it was suppose to restart the show for the new ages but starting with #1 sounded to me more logically for a remake or redesign on the same lines as Galactica and not to continue the long line of the Who series. Yes it was a new intro to new fans but yet it was strongly tied to the old series. So I m more to side with Steven's train of thought and go back to continue the old numbering or just say it is the first series of smith's doctor

This would be series 31, technically, and I think
that's amazing, since we never thought it would get this far. Plus,
calling it 31 makes it seem like one continuous show and one continuous
Doctor. We don't call the first Tom Baker season series one, nor
Patrick Troughton's. I'm calling it 31.

- Cheers

"I collect stars, but I keep them in the sky because I just don't have the space at home." - Warren Ellis

As far as I am concerned, it was always going to be series 31 to me. Especially since so many people will sometimes use 'season' for 'series' and season 1 - 3 of Doctor Who is with William Hartnell, renumbering it as series 1 in 2005 was a bad idea (unless we were to believe that the 9th Doctor was the 1st Doctor or if the series was retitled to something like Doctor Who: The Next (Re)Generation).

To avoid confusion, I simply referred to each series by the year that it was televised. While internally here, they were labeled season 27, 28, 29, and 30. I toyed with the notion of labeling the 2009 series of specials, as season 31 since the 2008 series already had finale episode and Xmas special... but I changed it to be all season 30 since the specials were all being considered still part of what they were calling "Series 4."

So what Steven Moffat is saying is something I can go along with and have been going along with anyway. This upcoming series is season/series 31. I still may refer to it as the 2010 series at times, though I doubt I will call it series 1 unless it is proceeded by "Matt Smith's" before it (or "Steven Moffat's" for that reason).